It was inspiring to read your story about Coloradans traveling to New York to urge leaders to act to solve global warming. I was one of the hundreds of thousands of participants in the People’s Climate March, and it was incredible to see so many hopeful people in one place.

The march is just the beginning, however. We must continue to press leaders to act to limit global warming pollution and accelerate our transition to clean energy.

The Environmental Protection Agency’s proposed Clean Power Plan is a chance for us to keep up the pressure and put our leaders to the test. The proposal puts limits on carbon pollution from power plants, and would be the biggest step America has ever taken to fight global warming.

Getting this plan across the finish line is the sort of action the march intended to catalyze. Now let’s get it done.

Annie Sanders, Denver

This letter was published in the Oct. 6 edition.

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U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Gina McCarthy testifies before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee on Capitol Hill on July 23. The committee heard testimony on EPA’s proposed carbon pollution standards for existing power plants. (Mark Wilson, Getty Images)

Citing Pueblo’s abrupt transition from coal to gas, Vincent Carroll is justifiably concerned about the economic impacts of the Environmental Protection Agency’s Clean Power Plan.

The EPA is now taking comments on how states can reach the goal of 30 percent reduction of CO2 emissions from power plants by 2030. In its draft proposal, the EPA has not offered the market-based solution of a state carbon tax. A study by Regional Economic Models, Inc. found that a carbon tax in California would increase GDP and add hundreds of thousands of jobs while significantly reducing CO2 emissions, provided the revenue is returned to the public, either as tax cuts or direct payments. Other states would achieve similar benefits. If the EPA would allow for a state revenue-neutral carbon tax as an option to reach its goals, states would achieve even deeper cuts in their CO2 emissions while strengthening their economies.

Susan Secord, Boulder

This letter was published in the Aug. 9 edition.

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Opponents of the Environmental Protection Agency’s Clean Power Plan are starting to sound a bit redundant. Their argument, laid out by Stuart Sanderson, president of the Colorado Mining Association, is that the plan will raise electricity costs. Unsurprisingly, the only people really speaking up on this side of the issue are in the coal industry. Despite their claims, even environmentalists don’t like higher electricity bills. And environmentalists don’t hate jobs, either. It’s simply that they’ve realized that the cost-benefit analysis laid out by opponents of the Clean Power Plan includes only immediate costs and benefits, especially as they apply to the coal industry.

Supporters of the Clean Power Plan understand that the long-term costs of climate change far outweigh economic costs it will have in the next few years.

The negative health effects of carbon pollution and smog, dangerous extreme weather events, and damage to ecosystems will ultimately prove to be much more expensive to our country than cleaning up dirty coal-fired power plants today. Yes, the coal industry will take a hit if the rule passes, but the future of our planet will take an even harder hit if it doesn’t.

Ellen Plane, Denver

This letter was published in the July 31 edition.

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